The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I wonder how the Romans of the mid-Republican era thought about this, dying in battle. These were the real superheavyweights when it came to martial valour and refusing to lose. They drowned Hannibal in Roman blood.
Rome lost badly at Lake Trasimene, they got thumped again at Trebia.
At Cannae, the Romans were going all out. They raised eight legions for a single campaign, more than ever before. They lost them all. The Macedonians entered the war against Rome, the Sicilians revolted, some of their Italian allies switched sides. Then they lost another 25,000 men at Silva Latana.
They lost about 20% of their adult male citizens in 2 years! After all that they doubled down, committing to total war and ultimate victory.
Truly a land of 'Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori'. As much as Wilfred Owens has demolished that old line of Horace, it's worth considering that Britain's experience in WW1 paled in comparison to what Rome went through in the Second Punic War.
Damnit the Romans were such chads. Every time I think I know enough about them I realize I don’t.
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